Sony DAT Compression

[DebiJo]

I have a Sony SDT-7000/BM DAT drive that is advertised as a 4gig native and 8gig compressed. The most I am getting is 5.6gig. Does this sound acceptable to anyone? I tried Sony tech support. They say, compression is working, end of story. We are trying to backup various files, word documents and that sort of thing. No pictures or anything like that.

I'm thinking a 1:1.4 compression on a 1:2 advertised drive is not acceptable. Does anyone else have this type of drive and are you getting better compression that me?

Thanks in advance,
Debi

 

[Rols]

The greatest influence on the data compression is the type of data you are backing up (you seem to have a good idea of this). You will never acheive the full compression ratio and 1:1.4 for a 1:2 ratio drive is still a very good performance.

 

[DebiJo]

So, why does the type of tape drive make such a difference? We backed the exact same data mixture up on a 4-8 Travan drive and we were able to successfully back up more than 7 gig. But I can only get to 5.6 on the DAT.

Thanks,
Debi

 

[Rols]

Different drives use different technology & different algorithims to acheive their compression. Manufacturers are always looking to improve capacity & performance. Sony for example bost that their AIT3 drives will achieve 2.6:1 compression. While most other manufacturers only spec 2:1.

We all use different modes of transport to get to work - but in the end we all get there one way or another.